Opening with a powerful and tender 'Ode to the Hymen', Sharon Olds uses this age-old poetic form to address many aspects of herself, in a collection that is centred around the female body and female pleasures, and touches along the way on parts of her own story which will be familiar from earlier works, each episode and memory now burnished by the wisdom and grace of looking back. In such poems as 'Ode to My Sister', 'Ode of Broken Loyalty', 'Ode to My Whiteness', 'Blow Job Ode', 'Ode to the Last 38 Trees in New York City Visible from This Window', Olds treats us to an intimate self-examination that, like all her work, is universal and by turns searing and charming in its honesty. From the early bodily joys and sorrows of her girlhood to the recent deaths of those dearest to her - the 'Sheffield Mountain Ode' for Galway Kinnell is one of the most stunning pieces here - Olds shapes her world in language that is startlingly fresh, profound in its conclusions, and life-giving for the reader.
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I don't know when you came into being, inside me, when I was inside my mother - maybe when the involuntary muscles were setting like rose jello. ODE TO THE HYMEN
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(@vintagebooks, 8 September 2016, ebook, 130 pages, borrowed from @natpoetrylib via @OverDriveLibs)
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I'm a fan of the poet after having read a decent amount of her work. I was looking forward to reading Odes. I thought this was a terrific collection of bold, feminist and deeply personal poetry. Olds directly contracts many aspects of being a woman from taking you period, getting old and being harassed along with a slow of other poems about modern life and the modern world. An ode is an address to particular subject and that's exactly what Olds does with this bold, impressive collection. The poems felt very personal at times. The best poems included Ode to the Hymen, Ode to My Sister, Hip Replacement Ode, Ode to Menstrual Blood, Blow Job Ode, Split Ode, Toxic Shock Ode and Ode to Dirt.